For a few minutes neither spoke, and there was no sound but the crackling of the blaze and the distant voices of scouts down on the lake. "You can hear them plain up here," Tom said; "are your scouts fond of boating?" Still his companion did not speak. "Well, then," he finally said; "if you're going Thursday that means you go to-morrow. I was going to try to talk you into changing your mind, but just now, when I was piking around, and taking a squint at the work and at your face, I saw it wouldn't be any use. I guess people don't influence you much, hey?" "Roy Blakeley influenced me a lot." "Well then," said Barnard, "let's put the finishing touch on this job while both of us are here to do it. What do you say? Shall we haul up the flagpole?" The shortest way down the hill in the direction of the new property was across a little gully over which they had laid a log. This was a convenient way of going when there was no burden to be borne. The hauling and carrying were done at a point some hundred feet from this hollow. In the woods beyond, they had cut and hewn a flagstaff and since two could easily carry it, Barnard's idea was that this should be done then, so that he might have Tom's assistance. With Barnard, to think was to act, he was all impulse, and in two seconds he was on his feet and headed for their makeshift bridge across the gully. Tom followed him and was startled to see his friend go tumbling down into the hollow fully three feet from where the log lay. Before Tom reached the edge a scream, as of excruciating pain, arose, and he lost not a second in scrambling down into the chasm, where his companion lay upon the rocks, holding his forehead and groaning. CHAPTER XXIII FRIENDS "Take your hand off your forehead," Tom said, trying gently to move it against the victim's will; "so I can tell if it's bad. Don't be scared, you're stunned that's all. It's cut, but it isn't bleeding much." "I'm all right," Barnard said, trying to rise. "Maybe you are," Tom said, "but safety first; lie still. Can you move your arms? Does your back hurt?" "I don't want any doctor," Barnard said. "See if you can--no, lie still; see if you can wiggle your fingers. I guess you're just cut, that's all. Here, let me put my handkerchief around it. You got off lucky." "You don't call _that_ lucky, do you?" Barnard asked. "My head aches like blazes." "Sure it does," said Tom, feeling his friend's pulse, "but you're all right." [Illustration: TOM HELPED BARNARD TO THEIR CABIN. Tom Slade at Black Lake--Page 134] "I got a good bang in the head," said Barnard; "I'll be all right," he added, sitting up and gazing about him. "Case of look before you leap, hey? Do you know what I did?" "You stepped on the shadow instead of the log," Tom said. "I was going to call to you, but I thought that as long as you're a scout you'd know about that. It was on account of the fire--the way it was shining. That's what they call a false ford----"